CAN – CRSG legal battle. Lawyer fights outrageous remarks… I had to cut short my legal vacation to be in Calabar the better part of the Month of September 2013, leading the team of lawyers in the case instituted by All Progressives Congress (APC) against the Cross River State Independent Electoral Commission to upturn the obnoxious and draconian disqualification of APC from participating in the just concluded Local Government selection. The matters I shall address herein have nothing to do with the substance of the suit since the matter is subjudice. However, in course of the hearing of the preliminary objection filed by the Attorney General (AG) of Cross River State challenging the jurisdiction of the court, some peripheral issues arose which I think are worthy of sharing. On Wednesday 18th September, 2013, the court room was jam-packed with members of the public, with some persons unable to find seats. The reason for this was obvious: the matter had to do with the very soul of democracy in Cross River State. Just before the Attorney-General started the adumbration of his case, he asked the court to order all those who do not have seats to leave the courtroom as it had become too hot on account of their presence. I vehemently opposed the application and opined that our collective hardship is the direct consequence of the failure of governance and he as the supposed liaison between the judiciary and executive arms of government should be the last person to complain about the inadequacies of our courts. This is more so as the revenue appropriated to the judiciary from the consolidated revenue of the Federation is paid to executive arm of government which does as it likes with it. I prayed that he should suffer so much heat that he would remember to table matter before the next state executive council meeting. His response to my submissions was to say the least shocking. He said the Cross River State Government is unable to improve the courts because I, Matthew Ojua, have been frustrating the state government in its attempts to generate revenue by challenging it in courts of law. I would explain to you the genesis of that statement. In 1999, the Donald Duke’s administration introduced policies conferring exclusive right of purchase and exportation of cocoa beans on an agency of the State Government. The Cocoa Association of Nigeria (CAN) briefed me and I filed an action in the Federal High Court, Calabar. An injunction was granted against the state government stopping the obnoxious, illegal and primitive policy. Attah Ochinke Esq., the current AG was then Special Adviser on Trade and Investment. In 2004, the Urban Development Tax Law was enacted imposing the Urban Development Tax and unsuspecting and uninformed Cross Riverians were being ripped off of millions of Naira monthly. When in 2008, I was served with a demand notice to pay the said tax, I challenged the constitutionality of the law before the Cross River High Court of Justice. Government was defeated and the law was declared unconstitutional, null and void and of no consequence whatsoever. The Government appealed to the Court of Appeal and on the Day of Judgment, government mobilized both the electronic and print media to the court in the hope that the appeal would be in its favour. Government was again defeated and as expected the news of the judgment never saw the light of the day. I am, however, happy that I saved Cross Riverians from the scourge of that oppressive tax. The matter is now in the Supreme Court. Again in September, 2012, the Cross River State Government imposed and immediately commenced the collection of taxes on mining of sand, laterite, and gravel activities and allied matters. This, of course, shot the price of sand beyond the reach of the common man. I was briefed by all the Sand Unions across the Central and Northern Senatorial Districts of Cross River State. Pronto, I filed an action in the Cross River State High Court challenging the said taxation for being unconstitutional, illegal, null and void and no consequence whatsoever. The judge exhibited courage and government was defeated. The tax was voided and an injunction slammed restraining government from further collection of the said tax. There has been no appeal against the judgment but I only hope that the powers that be would return all the monies illegally collected from the battered and impoverished masses. In 2011, the Cross River State Government set up the Cross River State Cocoa Technical Monitoring Team for the enforcement of all manner of illegal levies and taxes including compelling the movement of cocoa out of the state to be made only through the Calabar Port. The penalty for the breach of the illegal directive is the payment of #150,000.00 per a trailer load of cocoa. Incidentally, the Calabar Port is neither owned nor managed by the Cross River State government. The only reason for the policy is to extort money from the cocoa industry which is almost comatose on account of the myriad of taxes. The money realised from these illegalities is not paid to government account but to a private bank account in Zenith bank and shared on a monthly basis. We have been briefed by the Cocoa Association of Nigeria and we are in court. I would, therefore, say no more! The above exposition of the litigation against the government explains why the Attorney General is putting their deliberate neglect to upgrade the courts at my feet. In all the 36 States and FCT, it is only Judges of Cross River State that cannot attend international conferences because the state government is asphyxiating the judiciary of funds. I interpret the statement of the AG to mean that it is the deliberate policy of CRS government to punish, stifle and suffocate the courts for having the courage to perform their constitutional role of adjudication without fear or favour. This is, of course, consistent with a government that can order its electoral body to conduct an election with the party in power as the only contestant. What a shame! This government needs to be educated on the role of the judiciary in a democratic dispensation. I recommend that they read the story of Justice John Sirica, the then Chief Judge of the U.S. District Court for the District Court of Columbia, who during the 1973 Watergate trials, ordered American President Richard Nixon, the most powerful person on earth at the time, to turn over tapes of White House conversations to special prosecutor, Archbald Cox. That order led to the resignation of President Nixon. That is the proper role of a judge. Not judges who would hold midnight meetings with government officials on the eve of their judgments. No, not judges like the Nigerian Gambian judge who was caught on video negotiating the sale of his judgment. Such persons are not judges but merchants and purveyors of injustice. My courage did not fail to tell the AG and the court of the real reasons why nothing is working in Cross River State and why we bake every day in oven- hot court rooms. I reminded him that the only legacy of his government is the preponderance of Ford SUVs (jeeps) purchased for all manner of government officials including personal assistants to special assistants. That the cost of one jeep would be enough to buy a sound proof generator to serve the courts. That if government could suspend, even for one year, the wasteful annual carnival, where naked women are imported into the state to upset the sensibilities of hungry Cross Riverians, there would be enough money to handle people-oriented programmes. I intimated the AG that even if government is laying streets of gold, it must generate its resources by legitimate means and not by illegal taxation. Where it to be otherwise, there would be no need to hack down armed robbers and kidnappers, because they too have reasons why they engage in their nefarious activities! I reminded him that CRS is the most taxed State in the country, where citizens are taxed for walking on the streets and that very soon we shall be paying tax for the air we breathe. Yet CRS is the fourth most indebted state in the country according to the Fiscal Responsibility Commission. The good news is that the trial judge refused to order the evacuation of the court to placate the AG. Except for the judge who brought in a small, possibly, battery operated standing fan for himself; all of us suffered the pains of excruciating heat. The only regret is that the AG does not appear in our Cross River Courts regularly. Indeed, I saw him in court for the first time since his appointment, possibly, because the case, which is still pending, had and has to do with the attempt by APC to stop the Local Government elections/cancel the farce that took place in the guise of elections. So much has been said about Cross Riverians and poverty. Indeed, I am told “a senator said because Cross Riverians are united in poverty, PDP would continue to win every election”. To the senator I say, he is as poor or rich as his constituents. He and his ilk are mere islands of affluence in a gigantic ocean of poverty. Charles Dickens had our scenario in mind in the opening lines of his novel, “A Tale of Two Cities” where he wrote thus:- “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair; we had everything before us, we had nothing before us” The senator may not know that even his party men are thoroughly disenchanted with the status quo. Most of the calls I get urging us on with the case against CROSIEC to have the selection of 21st September nullified come from PDP stalwarts, some of them senior appointees of government. You hear them making statements like “we are tired with these our oga and mama who are playing god.” Our mama picked all the vice-chairmen while our papa picked all the chairmen”. And I ask them “what in the heck are you still doing in that government?” And they unashamedly say “wetin man go do?” And I answer them the way Fr. George Ehusani taught me: man fit die! And I scream at them: “don’t you have honour and dignity? Are you suffering from such mental poverty that you cannot think out of the box and make a living outside a government you consider evil? Can’t you see that you are in self-imposed bondage and enslavement?” Cross Riverians shine your eyes. For me, I was born to rebel and revolt against all forms of oppression and injustice. I have thus far lived up to my calling. Not the filthy lucre of money, not the allure of plum political office, not all the wealth in the entire universe, or any form of intimidation would make me to suffer any form of corruption kindly. I shall never consciously compromise with evil. I would continue to be a voice for the voiceless. I would continue to be feet for the crippled and eyes for the blind and ears for the deaf. I shall continue to hold in absolute disdain those who steal our commonwealth and flaunt it, for they are worse than armed robbers, kidnappers and terrorists. I would not accept the status quo where one man works for thirty days and is grudgingly paid #18,000.00 take home pay that cannot even take him home, while another man spends 14 days abroad and works for a few days and takes home close to a billion Naira a month. And I shall continue to employ all known constitutional means and the courts of law to fight injustices and oppression against the masses of the people including unlawful taxation. So AG, be prepared, we are only just beginning!
Posted on: Sun, 29 Sep 2013 16:55:20 +0000
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015